Chapter One

Internet Concepts and the World Wide Web

Overview of the Internet
Internet is defined as an Information super highway, to access information over the web.
However, it can be defined in many ways as follows:
✓ Internet is a world-wide global system of interconnected computer networks.
✓ Internet uses the standard called Internet Protocol (TCP/IP).
Every computer in internet is identified by a unique IP address. IP Address is a unique set of
numbers (such as 110.22.33.114) which identifies a computer location. A special computer DNS
(Domain Name Server) is used to give name to the IP Address so that user can locate a computer
by a name. For example, a DNS server will resolve a name http://www.tutorialspoint.com to a
particular IP address to uniquely identify the computer on which this website is hosted.

✓ Internet is accessible to every user all over the world.

Evolution of the Internet

The concept of Internet was originated in 1969 and has undergone several technological &
Infrastructural changes. The origin of Internet devised from the concept of Advanced Research
Project Agency Network (ARPANET). ARPANET was developed by United States
Department of Defense. Basic purpose of ARPANET was to provide communication among the
various bodies of government. Initially, there were only four nodes, formally called Hosts. In
1972, the ARPANET spread over the globe with 23 nodes located at different countries and
thus became known as Internet. By the time, with invention of new technologies such as
TCP/IP protocols, DNS, WWW, browsers, scripting languages etc. Internet provided a medium
to publish and access information over the web.

Advantages
Internet covers almost every aspect of life, one can think of. Here are some of the advantages of
Internet:

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Apart from communication and source of information, internet also serves a medium for
entertainment. Following are the various modes for entertainment over internet.
Online Television Videos
Online Games Social Networking Apps
Songs
Internet also allows us to use many services like:
Internet Banking Online Bill Payment
Matrimonial Services Data Sharing
Online Shopping E-mail
Online Ticket Booking

Disadvantages
However, Internet has proved to be a powerful source of information in almost every field, yet
there exists many disadvantages discussed below:

Intranet
Intranet is defined as private network of computers within an organization with its own server
and firewall. Moreover we can define Intranet as:
Intranet is system in which multiple PCs are networked to be connected to each other.
PCs in intranet are not available to the world outside of the intranet.
Usually each company or organization has their own Intranet network and
members/employees of that company can access the computers in their intranet.
Every computer in internet is identified by a unique IP address.
Each computer in Intranet is also identified by a IP Address, which is unique among the
computers in that Intranet.

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Benefits
Intranet is very efficient and reliable network system for any organization. It is beneficial in
every aspect such as collaboration, cost-effectiveness, security, productivity and much more.

Applications of Intranet
Intranet applications are same as that of Internet applications. Intranet applications are also
accessed through a web browser. The only difference is that, Intranet applications reside on
local server while Internet applications reside on remote server. Here, we've discussed some of
these applications:

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Extranet
Extranet refers to network within an organization, using internet to connect to the outsiders in
controlled manner. It helps to connect businesses with their customers and suppliers and
therefore allows working in a collaborative manner.

Extranet is implemented as a Virtual Private Networks (VPN) because it uses internet to connect
to corporate organization and there is always a threat to information security. VPN offers a
secure network in public infrastructure (Internet).
VPN uses Internet Protocol Security Architecture (IPSEC) Protocol to provide secure
transactions by adding an additional security layer to TCP/IP protocol. This layer is created by
encapsulating the IP packet to a new IP packet as shown in the following diagram:

Benefits
Extranet proves to be a successful model for all kind of businesses whether small or big. Here
are some of the advantages of extranet for employees, suppliers, business partners, and
customers:

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Issues
Apart for advantages there are also some issues associated with extranet. These issues are
discussed below:
Hosting
Where the extranet pages will be held i.e. who will host the extranet pages. In this context there
are two choices:
✓ Host it on your own server.
✓ Host it with an Internet Service Provider (ISP) in the same way as web pages. But
hosting extranet pages on your own server requires high bandwidth internet connection
which is very costly.
Security: Additional firewall security is required if you host extranet pages on your own server
which result in a complex security mechanism and increase work load.
Accessing Issues: Information cannot be accessed without internet connection. However,
information can be accessed in Intranet without internet connection.
Decreased Interaction: It decreases the face to face interaction in the business which results in
lack of communication among customers, business partners and suppliers.

World Wide Web

WWW stands for World Wide Web. A technical definition of the World Wide Web is: all the
resources and users on the Internet that are using the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). A
broader definition comes from the organization that Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee helped
found, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
The World Wide Web is the universe of network-accessible information, an embodiment of
human knowledge. In simple terms, The World Wide Web is a way of exchanging information
between computers on the Internet, tying them together into a vast collection of interactive

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multimedia resources. Internet and Web is not the same thing: Web uses internet to pass over
the information.
Evolution
World Wide Web was created by Timothy Berners Lee in 1989 at CERN in Geneva. World
Wide Web came into existence as a proposal by him, to allow researchers to work together
effectively and efficiently at CERN. Eventually it became World Wide Web. The following
diagram briefly defines evolution of World Wide Web:

WWW works on client- server approach. Following steps explains how the web works:
1. User enters the URL (say, http://www.tutorialspoint.com) of the web page in the
address bar of web browser.
2. Then browser requests the Domain Name Server for the IP address corresponding to
www.tutorialspoint.com.
3. After receiving IP address, browser sends the request for web page to the web server
using HTTP protocol which specifies the way the browser and web server
communicates.
4. Then web server receives request using HTTP protocol and checks its search for the
requested web page. If found it returns it back to the web browser and close the HTTP
connection.
5. Now the web browser receives the web page, It interprets it and display the contents of
web page in web browser’s window.

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Hypertext Transfer Protocols
HTTP Overview
The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is an application-level protocol for distributed,
collaborative, hypermedia information systems. This is the foundation for data communication
for the World Wide Web (i.e. internet) since 1990.
Basically, HTTP is a TCP/IP based communication protocol, that is used to deliver data (HTML
files, image files, query results, etc.) on the World Wide Web. The default port is TCP 80, but
other ports can be used as well. It provides a standardized way for computers to communicate
with each other. HTTP specification specifies how clients' request data will be constructed and
sent to the server, and how the servers respond to these requests.
Basic Features
There are three basic features that make HTTP a simple but powerful protocol:
HTTP is connectionless: The HTTP client, i.e., a browser initiates an HTTP request and
after a request is made, the client waits for the response. The server processes the request
and sends a response back after which client disconnect the connection. So client and
server know about each other during current request and response only. Further requests
are made on new connection like client and server are new to each other.

HTTP is media independent: It means, any type of data can be sent by HTTP as long
as both the client and the server know how to handle the data content. It is required for
the client as well as the server to specify the content type using appropriate MIME-type.

HTTP is stateless: As mentioned above, HTTP is connectionless and it is a direct result

of HTTP being a stateless protocol. The server and client are aware of each other only
during a current request. Afterwards, both of them forget about each other. Due to this
nature of the protocol, neither the client nor the browser can retain information between
different requests across the web pages.
HTTP/1.0 uses a new connection for each request/response exchange, where as HTTP/1.1
connection may be used for one or more request/response exchanges.
Basic Architecture
The following diagram shows a very basic architecture of a web application and depicts where
HTTP sits:

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The HTTP protocol is a request/response protocol based on the client/server based architecture
where web browsers, robots and search engines, etc. act like HTTP clients, and the Web server
acts as a server.
Client
The HTTP client sends a request to the server in the form of a request method, URI, and
protocol version, followed by a MIME-like message containing request modifiers, client
information, and possible body content over a TCP/IP connection.
Server
The HTTP server responds with a status line, including the message's protocol version and a
success or error code, followed by a MIME-like message containing server information, entity
meta information, and possible entity-body content.
URL
URL stands for Uniform Resource Locator, and is used to specify addresses on the World Wide
Web. A URL is the fundamental network identification for any resource connected to the web
(e.g., hypertext pages, images, and sound files).
A URL will have the following format:
Protocol: //hostname/other_information
The protocol specifies how information is transferred from a link. The protocol used for web
resources is HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP). Other protocols compatible with most web
browsers include FTP, telnet, newsgroups, and Gopher. The protocol is followed by a colon, two
slashes, and then the domain name. The domain name is the computer on which the resource is
located. Links to particular files or subdirectories may be further specified after the domain
name. The directory names are separated by single forward slashes.
Website
Website is a collection of various pages written in HTML markup language. This is a location
on the web where people can find tutorials on latest technologies. Similarly, there are millions of
websites available on the web. Each page available on the website is called a web page and first
page of any website is called home page for that site.
Web Server
Every Website sits on a computer known as a Web server. This server is always connected to the
internet. Every Web server that is connected to the Internet is given a unique address made up of
a series of four numbers between 0 and 256 separated by periods. For example, 68.178.157.132
or 68.122.35.127. When you register a Web address, also known as a domain name, such as
tutorialspoint.com you have to specify the IP address of the Web server that will host the site.
Web Browsers
Web Browsers are software installed on your PC. To access the Web you need a web browsers,
such as Netscape Navigator, Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox.
Currently you must be using any sort of Web browser while you are navigating through my site
tutorialspoint.com. On the Web, when you navigate through pages of information this is
commonly known as browsing or surfing.

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SMTP Server
SMTP stands for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol Server. This server takes care of delivering
emails from one server to another server. When you send an email to an email address, it is
delivered to its recipient by a SMTP Server.
ISP
ISP stands for Internet Service Provider. They are the companies who provide you service in
terms of internet connection to connect to the internet. You will buy space on a Web Server
from any Internet Service Provider. This space will be used to host your Website.

How the Web Works

When you enter something like google.com, the request goes to one of many special computers
on the Internet known as Domain Name Servers (DNS). All these requests are routed through
various routers and switches. The domain name servers keep tables of machine names and their
IP addresses, so when you type in google.com, it gets translated into a number, which identifies
the computers that serve the Google Website to you.

When you want to view any page on the Web, you must initiate the activity by requesting a page
using your browser. The browser asks a domain name server to translate the domain name you
requested into an IP address. The browser then sends a request to that server for the page you
want, using a standard called Hypertext Transfer Protocol or HTTP.

The server should constantly be connected to the Internet, ready to serve pages to visitors. When
it receives a request, it looks for the requested document and returns it to the Web browser.
When a request is made, the server usually logs the client's IP address, the document requested,
and the date and time it was requested. This information varies server to server.

An average Web page actually requires the Web browser to request more than one file from the
Web server and not just the HTML / XHTML page, but also any images, style sheets, and other
resources used in the web page. Each of these files including the main page needs a URL to
identify each item. Then each item is sent by the Web server to the Web browser and Web
browser collects all this information and displays them in the form of Web page.

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